Coccidia are a protozoan internal parasite, that most goats have, in small numbers. In adults, this is generally not a problem, but if kids get an overload of coccidia, it can cause diarrhea, intestinal scarring, and ultimately death, if not treated. The first line of prevention for coccidia in kids is to keep their areas clean. This may seem like an unreasonable expectation--it's a barn, for all love--but what this means is essentially making sure the kids have minimal access to poop--they pick up coccidia from mouthing poop, soiled straw, etc. This can mean cleaning out the pen every day, or it can mean adding a new layer of straw once or twice a day, or even both. A good criteria (picked up from Deborah at the Thrifty Homesteader) is that you should be willing to sit down in the stall. Then, it's clean enough for kids. If you're not willing to sit down (while wearing "barn" pants. Not wearing a fancy dress, for instance) it's not clean enough for kids. In
Sorry it's been awhile since I posted! School is absolutely eating me alive.
Let's move into disease testing!
What
Goats are generally tested for three main diseases--CAE (Caprine Encephalitis Arthritis Virus), CL (Caseous lymphadenitis), and Johnes Disease. Occasionally, tests for Brucellosis and Q Fever are done as well, but it's usually just CAE, CL, and Johnes.
Why
Those three diseases (CAE, CL, Johnes) are incurable and chronic. Meaning that if your goat gets it, they will have it forever. Goat owners obviously don't want this--so if your goat is going to be around any other goats (for breeding, shows, and such), they need to be tested.
How
There are two options for disease testing:
1. Have you vet draw the blood and run the tests
2. Draw the blood yourself and send it away to the UBRL lab to be tested
For #1, it's pretty easy--call the vet and schedule the test! #2 is a little more complicated, and not for the sqeamish. Legolas, I know that when I leave you will probably go with option #1, and that's fine.
The Steps:
1. Acquire blood draw equipment. Generally what's needed is simply syringes and blood tubes. A set of hair clippers can make things easier, and some people use alcohol wipes, but I find that I have to try so many places that I couldn't alcohol wipe all of them, or fast enough.
For syringes, the best kind to use are Luer Lock Syringes (the "lock" part means that the needles twist on, so they stay on, instead of accidentally popping off). We generally get 3 cc, 22 gauge, 3/4" ones. You can find them HERE.
The blood tubes used are "red top tubes" or "tiger tubes", vacuum tubes with no preservatives in them. We just buy them in small quantities from UBRL. They can be found HERE. They come with a different style of needle, which we don't use because they are too fiddly, and are goats are squirmy.
2. Draw the blood. I can't give expert instructions on this, but these are the videos I like to use to review before doing blood draws. The first one is on a full-size goat, the second on a Nigerian. There are lots of other good videos on YouTube as well, I'm sure.
Some years it's been harder, and some easier--you may find that some goats have smaller veins, so it's harder to find, and others have larger. The vein is often easier to find on lighter-colored goats, but in general, our darker-colored goats have larger veins. Not sure if that's actually correlated or not. :) We've found that we can get away with a little less than 2 ml (cc) of blood for disease tests, and all the blood doesn't have to be drawn in one go--although it should be drawn no more than an hour or two apart. Less is more optimal.
3. Fill out THIS form from UBRL after labelling the tubes of blood. (Make sure you tell them apart!
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